


Thank You for Waking Me Up

by flonkertons



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Mentions of Death, Second Chance at Life, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-23
Updated: 2016-05-23
Packaged: 2018-06-10 04:11:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6939121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flonkertons/pseuds/flonkertons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>She took a moment to consider him and he didn't want to back down, didn't want to let her win whatever this was, so he stared back at her. Then, there was approval in her eyes. "You know, not many people would've done that. Saved that girl like that."</i>
</p><p>
  <i>"Too bad it was pointless." </i>
</p><p>
  <i>"Still saved that girl. Brought you here. And you'll get a second chance at life."</i>
</p><p> </p><p>When Bellamy died, he never expected to become Spirit Detective, meet Clarke Griffin, or be offered a second chance at life. Oddly enough, that's exactly what happens.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thank You for Waking Me Up

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, this is a Yu Yu Hakusho AU, but also it's not really, because the show is way better and I only use a few elements from it. (Please watch it.) 
> 
> Technically, there is major character death, but the point of the fic, since I started it, has always been for them to come back to life, so I felt like that wouldn't ring true. So there are mentions of death, but DON'T WORRY, I'M NOT DOING A BAIT AND SWITCH. It's me we're talking about. They're gonna be happy.
> 
> And as always, ty Wikihow for teaching me about life.

Bellamy was offered a job the day he died. As far as death went, it wasn’t exactly what he thought would happen.

“What,” he said flatly, staring up at the man sitting at the desk. _MARCUS KANE_ , the nameplate said. Bellamy couldn’t have cared less.

“I would like you to become our Spirit Detective. Temporarily, of course.” He smiled at him, or what looked like a smile, if he stretched the definition of _smile_.

“I don’t know what any of that means.” He pushed his glasses up and scowled. If it could do anything, couldn’t death have given him perfect vision? Or, at the very least, glasses that fit him correctly?

Marcus Kane seemed unfazed, launching right into an explanation. “Right now, you're in Spirit World. It’s where souls go when they’ve died, or in your case, where they go when they’re very nearly dead. Since you are a special case, I’m offering you a chance to stay alive, provided, of course, you accept a tenure as our Spirit Detective."

Admittedly, his curiosity got the best of him. Like always. Almost begrudgingly, he asked, “Why?”

“Because our current Spirit Detective is retiring. She’s ready to go back home, which leaves us in a tricky position.”

"You don't have a replacement?"

"We do, however, Luna won't be ready for a few months. We are hoping you would fill in those few months until she's ready."

“How many months?"

“Three. Does this mean you accept?” _Now_ he smiled, a real one with victory in his eyes. Bellamy almost turned it down just so he could wipe that away.

“What’s in it for me?” He asked instead, crossing his arms.

“You have a sister.” His heart clenched, along with his fist. “You want to go back home to her.”

“Don’t talk about her,” he warned. “Don’t even mention her.”

“Three months.”

It was probably a bad idea. Honestly, it was most likely a dream. A weird, confusing one, but a dream, nonetheless. Things like this just didn’t fucking happen. But if it wasn’t, and he _was_ dead, or almost dead, or something along those lines – and he felt dead-almost-dead – then he could come back to life. He could leave this place, Spirit World, which he seemed to accept as a concept a lot more easily than anything. He thought of Octavia, remembered the last time they talked, and despite it, missed her so suddenly that it hurt. “Fine. I accept.”

 

***

 

Kane sent him to another room after that, and it was there that he realized that he hadn’t actually asked what a Spirit Detective was. He got the gist of it, because it wasn't hard to figure out the general concept. That much was obvious. But what did Spirit World need a _detective_ for?

"We have crime here too," a voice said from behind and he whirled around in surprise to find a girl, blonde hair, blue eyes, eyebrow raised. She looked around his age, but whether that was because people aged here too, or because she had been that age when she died, he wasn't sure.

"Mindreader?"

"You had that look." She came closer and he saw that she was pretty, and also hot in an intimidating way, but more obviously, had a weariness that undercut her age. He felt weird noticing both things – first off, he was technically dead, so he should probably have more important things on his mind, and secondly, he hated to describe someone as world weary, felt like he couldn't apply to a stranger he just met. But it accompanied her. There was a scar on her cheek and a hard look in her eye.

"Lucky guess."

She shrugged, sitting down on the couch next to them. She didn't make an offer for him to sit down, but he did anyways. "Just been around the block a few times."

Bellamy turned to face her, one arm slung around the back of the couch. "Who are you again?"

She had been so assured, so much like she had better places to be, other things to do, that it was impossible not to notice the slight falter in her demeanor. "Kane didn't tell you?"

"He said like five things, none of which made much sense."

"What do you know?"

"I'm dead," he said bluntly. "Or almost, whatever. I do this thing for a few months and then I get to, I don't know, not die?"

"He never gives out any actual information," she grumbled. "Okay, Bellamy?" At this point, he couldn't be surprised she knew his name. "You weren't supposed to die."

"A car hit me. Straight on. Hard to avoid that." There had been a kid, a little girl who was chasing a ball in the street. She ran right towards the middle, and he hadn't given it a second thought, just ran after her, pushed her out of the way, and the last thing he remembered before he died – or lost consciousness, he supposed – was the sound of the girl crying, loud and sharp.

There was a hint of a smile on her face. "The car would've swerved and avoided the girl if you hadn't run out to save her." She said it so lightly, almost amused, and he didn't understand what was so funny about it. So he was dead for no reason?

"That makes it so much better," he snapped.

She took a moment to consider him and he didn't want to back down, didn't want to let her win whatever this was, so he stared back at her. Then, there was approval in her eyes. "You know, not many people would've done that. Saved that girl like that."

"Too bad it was pointless." He refused to take it as a compliment. He wasn't even sure it was meant to be a compliment.

"Still saved that girl. Brought you here. And you'll get a second chance at life."

He thought of Octavia again. "Listen, you haven't even told me your name, let alone how this all works."

She sighed, like this was a burdensome question to answer. It was just her _name_. "Clarke. Kane believes that since, well, your death was avoidable, you should get to avoid it. Right now, your body is lying in a coma at the hospital. There is no change in your condition, but you're not critical. Once you complete your three months, you can go back."

It sounded so farfetched, so impossible that Bellamy didn't believe it. This wasn't a thing that _happened_ , but apparently it _was_. He shook his head, overwhelmed. "And why should I trust you? Or Kane? I just met you like ten minutes ago."

"It's not really a matter of trust," she said. "You've already accepted the deal."

He pinched the bridge of his nose, took off his glasses, and scrubbed a hand over his face. "I don't even know what I'm supposed to be doing."

Clarke reached out to pat his bicep, almost patronizingly, he thought. Maybe he was projecting. "Don't worry about that."

"I know you don't know me, but I'm really bad at not worrying about shit."

"And I know you don't know me, but trust me on this."

He gave in. "Why?"

She offered her hand to shake. "I'm the current Spirit Detective. I'm going to help you."

He blinked, once, twice, at her. Kane had said something, that she was ready to go back – to the real, _alive_ world. Like him. His handshake was weak, incredulity laced in his fingers, and he felt like he had been inundated with so much impossible information that he could never process, and at the same time, like he had a million questions to ask her.

"Okay," he heard himself saying. "One more question."

"Yes?"

"What the _hell_ is a Spirit Detective?"

 

***

 

Clarke gave him a tour of Spirit World headquarters along with a crash course in Spirit World 101. It turned out Kane was the chief administrator of Spirit World and, like a running theme for the rest of Spirit World, it ran like a regular bureaucratic government, with lots of paperwork and lots of complaints. It was the first stop for recently deceased souls, who floated through the place until they were assigned a destination. There wasn't _law enforcement_ , there was just a Spirit Detective and they were responsible for a lot of things but mostly tracking down lost souls, tracking down lost items, and tracking down and bringing in the criminals of the Spirit World.

He found out three things about Clarke: she had been eighteen when she died, was now twenty one (clearing up the issue of aging while dead), and had been Spirit Detective for those three years. Although he was curious about her, he stopped himself from pressing for more. She had refused to even give him her last name, and he didn't want to push anymore.

She ended the tour on the top level of the building, pressing a sequence of numbers into the keypad that unlocked the door.

He followed her inside, looking around. Clarke tossed her coat onto the back of a chair, and he realized it was an apartment.

"I kinda forgot to tell you," she said, looking back behind her briefly. "We're living together."

He tripped on the carpet.

 

***

 

The next morning, he tugged on the shirt he had been wearing yesterday and warily trudged out to the kitchen. The guest room was nice and he had basically passed out asleep as soon as he got into bed but he still wasn't sure about living with a stranger. He wasn't sure about this whole dead thing, if he really wanted to get to the root of the problem. But then again, Clarke was nice, or she must be if she was willing to let him crash with her for three months.

"There are clothes in the closet," she said as a greeting, collecting some scattered papers back into the folder in front of her.

"Oh," he said. "How–"

"The guy before me, Bryan, he left some things behind so when Kane told me about all this, I just figured it'd be handy to have around. You're pretty similar in build except you're–" Clarke clamped her mouth shut, diverting her eyes away from him to the folder. She cleared her throat. "Taller. Than he was."

He raised an eyebrow at her response, but didn't comment on it, just sat down across from her and tried to decide what question he should ask first. "Thanks. So, what's in it for you?" He settled on that one.

Clarke looked up. "You'll have to elaborate."

He had a feeling she knew what he meant already. "Letting me stay here, showing me around, helping me, why are you doing this?"

Mildly, "Because Kane asked me to."

"And you always do what Kane says?"

"He's my boss, so generally, yes."

"It's just a lot."

"It's part of the deal we made." She hesitated, chewing on her lip in debate. Then, as if she had decided against her better judgement, she continued. "When I accepted the position three years ago, it was supposed to be permanent. And then I changed my mind."

"And you're not supposed to change your mind about this," he guessed. She grimaced in affirmation.

"So I have to make sure you're doing it right and then I'm done," she shrugged it off like it wasn't a big deal. Maybe it wasn't.

"Just three months?"

"Just three months."

He nodded and they lapsed into silence, Clarke returning her attention back to the folder while he restlessly drummed his fingers on the table. He wondered what was so interesting in that folder for her to focus so deeply on it and thought about asking.

Instead: "What made you change your mind?"

There was a rustle of paper as Clarke froze. "That's not really your business."

"No, but I'm curious."

"Curiosity killed the cat."

"Yeah, but we're dead anyways, so it must cancel out somehow." The corner of her mouth twitched upward just slightly, and he was pleased with himself for a second.

"I'm still not telling you."

No one could say he didn't _try_. "Quid pro quo?"

She rolled her eyes and then closed the folder, clutching it to her chest and standing up. "Nice try."

"Are you going somewhere?"

" _We_ are. There's a case."

"That was quick," he remarked. He thought – hoped – that training would be little more than going over the basics of his job, maybe just reading over information. Bellamy was familiar with that, and even missed it. (It was weird to think about his life now – was he supposed to say that he _used to be_ a librarian? Or that he was taking a break? He pushed it into the back of his mind instead.)

"What's that saying?" She asked, putting on her jacket and waiting by the door. "No rest for the wicked?"

 

***

 

He took one look at them and tilted his head. "This is the wicked?"

"Mostly just a pain in my ass. JASPER!"

The boy – Jasper – jumped, startled. Almost comically, he turned around sheepishly, followed by his friend, Monty, according to the brief rundown Clarke had given him just five minutes prior. Two humans, twenty, wanted again and again for selling anything and everything to the Spirit World inhabitants, a kind of one stop has all sort of booth. They could pass to and from the two worlds – Spirit and Human, Clarke explained – and used that power to make a buck or two. And clearly they weren't the best at keeping it secret.

"Hey, Clarke!" Monty said cheerfully, waving at them as they came closer. Clarke crossed her arms and Jasper shrank back. Bellamy stood to the side, watching the scene unfold.

"I warned you last time," she sighed, exasperated but also kind of fond.

"We were hoping you were really busy today," Monty explained, seemingly unfazed by Clarke's disapproval. How many times had they done this already? "And you should see the haul we brought in today, it's –"

"Who's he?" Jasper butt in, coming forward to point at Bellamy.

"Your new Spirit Detective," Clarke said. Bellamy jerked his head at them, attempted an intimidating look just for the hell of it. At least Jasper's eyes widened, which he gladly took as a success. Monty just appraised him.

"Bellamy," he offered.

"You're leaving?"

"Something like that." Not for the first time, he wondered what Clarke was hiding, why she continued to be so evasive, even with people like Monty and Jasper, who she obviously liked enough to have an edge of fondness in her voice.

Bellamy spoke up. "So what do you do with them now? Spirit World jail? Do you have that?"

" _Jail_ ?" Jasper all but shrieked. He looked around in a panic, bumping into one of the edge of the table in front of him. Clarke shot him a look, as if she'd expected better of him, but Bellamy wanted to point out that this was his _first time_ here and it was a legitimate question.

" _No_ ," she said, raising her voice to quell Jasper's outburst. "These guys, I usually just let them off with a warning, except they keep _ignoring them_ so it's obviously not working." The boys looked down, chastised, and Bellamy smothered a laugh. If this was the extent of the job, he could probably handle it. He had practically _raised_ Octavia; he was great at stern looks and warnings. Octavia was also great at ignoring all of that, but she was his sister, so that was a given.

"Can you suspend their access to Spirit World for a few months? They come and go right now, but get the gates to keep them out for a bit," he suggested. All three sets of eyes looked at him, Monty and Jasper gaping, Clarke reluctantly impressed.

"But –"

"Come on, Jas, it's not that bad of a deal," Monty said, resigned.

"I'll talk to Kane and see what they can do," Clarke said decisively. She cut her eyes at him again and he swore he saw a _thanks_ in them.

Being a Spirit Detective wasn't so bad after all.

 

***

 

He decided to embrace the whole thing.

After the three months was over, who else would be able to say that they had died, but not really died, found out something called the Spirit World existed, and also become a detective for the aforementioned world? Clarke, he supposed, but Clarke was different. Clarke was the only one who knew what he was going through. Then again, maybe it didn't really matter because who would really _believe_ any of this? If his friends didn't listen to his history stories before, then they definitely wouldn't listen to this one.

As far as cases went, Clarke must've been giving him all the easy ones, all the ones involving petty crimes, nothing that merited more than a warning or a write-up. The way she talked, there were definitely worse people that she had encountered, not like the Montys and Jaspers of the world, not like Fox, who had a habit for pickpocketing, or Harper, who was fond of vandalizing the entranceway to Spirit World. She was still cagey about herself, but she had plenty of Spirit Detective stories and was eager to share. He suspected it was because she hadn't really been able to share it with anyone else before.

Whatever the reason was, she was easy to talk to, and it was from that that they started hanging out outside of work (though most of that time was in the apartment, on the couch, watching a movie), getting to know each other.

He started telling her about himself, about how he was getting a Master's in classical history, how his thesis explored the constantly reshaping boundaries of the Roman Empire and its influence on the development of modern nation-states, how he's moved to three different states in five years, how he raised Octavia after his mom died, even before she died, how they had gotten into their biggest fight yet when she said she was dropping out of school, how much he missed Octavia.

He hadn't done it to get anything out of her, because while he did want to get to know Clarke – for a lot of reasons, because if they were going to be a team, he wanted to know what kind of person she was (he thinks he's getting a good idea) and if he could trust her (and he thinks he's getting there), because he liked her as a person, because he wanted to be her friend – but it must've helped in some way.

Clarke offered more information – her last name (Griffin of the D.C. Griffins, the Senate Majority Leader's daughter), her rocky relationship with her mom, her dad's death. She told him about how her best friend Wells was murdered while saving her life, how her first boyfriend was also someone else's boyfriend at the same time, and how her ex girlfriend turned her back on her and left her to die. He learned she was supposed to be pre-med before she died, but didn't know if that was something she still wanted. A building had collapsed on her the day she died.

He realized that she didn't trust easily, not with everything she'd gone through, so whenever she did open up, willingly, even happily, Bellamy felt buoyed by that show of faith, in him, in his trust.

Every time Clarke told him something about herself, he tucked it away as a piece of the puzzle he was constructing about her. Maybe she wasn't so hard to figure out.

 

***

 

Clarke dropped a ticket in his lap and when he looked up from his book, his mouth went dry.

It wasn't that she wasn't always pretty (because she was, especially when she was exasperated with him), but it was the first time he'd seen her dressed up like this, a flowy dress, light cardigan, hair down, two strands braided back, ever present watch on her wrist. He dragged his eyes away from her, which ended up being a more Herculean task than he'd thought, and focused on the ticket.

_Spirit World Exhibition, 2-4 PM_

_Museum of Supernatural Artifacts_

He had passed the museum a week ago, first astounded that Spirit World had a museum (although it made sense on two levels: Spirit World liked to boast that it wasn't that different from the real world, except for the dead factor, and it maintained a large collection of various artifacts), but that lapsed into a desire to visit it at least once before he had to go back. Unfortunately, he had been too busy since then to go.

"This is today?"

"Yeah. Um," Clarke sounded nervous. It was also the first time she sounded even the slightest bit _shy_. She was assertive and bold and reserved, but never _shy_. He had looked upon that in admiration, but he realized that he liked this too, liked that he was always learning something new about Clarke Griffin.

"I thought maybe you wanted to go."

He looked at his ticket again. "Yeah, I really, really do." That was an understatement; he was buzzing from the excitement already, had already tossed his book aside. And then – "How'd you know?"

"You had a look in your eye when you passed it and you love history so I thought, well, it'd be a good idea, and since it's your birthday –"

"Wait," he said, thinking about it. "Oh god. It is."

She snorted out a laugh. "How could you forget?"

"I guess I didn't really pay attention to the date." He never expected to turn twenty four in a purgatory-level world. There was also the matter of him being kinda-sorta-dead-but-not-really, so did it actually _count_ ? Time passed by the same, but _still_.

"Well, happy birthday, anyways. I just –" She cleared her throat, a flush on her cheeks. "Thought you should get at least one gift today."

He felt a swell of affection for her, couldn't stop the smile from spreading across his face. "This is an awesome gift, Clarke. Thank you so much."

"It's a really nice place. You'll really like it."

"Do you have a ticket?"

"What?"

"We should go together! I mean, if you have another ticket, because it'd be really cool and you've been there before so –"

"Yeah, yeah, I do –"

"– you know, just, if you do. If not, I'd definitely bring back all the pamph– oh." So that was why she looked so nice. Bellamy was certain that he had a huge grin on his face, because he was that happy. "Um, I'll be ready in ten minutes."

"You have plenty of time."

"Yeah, but –" He flapped his hands in front of him. "This is going to be _so_ cool."

He heard her laugh all the way to his room.

 

***

 

As birthday presents and birthdays went, Bellamy placed this one in his top five. The museum was amazing and he had never seen so many supernatural things in one place before (– or ever), but if he was being honest, the best part was the way Clarke took him around the place, explaining in detail about every display, every artifact. Her eyes lit up when she told him about the painting that had once been a portal to another dimension, the helmet that belonged to a warlord that never won any fights, the compass that sought out demons.

All in all, it was a great gift. He needed to find out when Clarke's birthday was so he could plan something for her.

Something caught his eye as they rounded the corner. He stopped and looked closer, pushing his glasses up. "You have something in here?" It was a knife, one that didn't look particularly special, aside from the polished silver of the blade, placed inside the glass display case. In front of the case, the label: _CLARKE GRIFFIN, 98TH SPIRIT DETECTIVE_.

Clarke groaned, slouching against the wall. A couple of people glared at her, but, as he found out today, they respected her too much to say anything. Her clout as Spirit Detective extended far. "It's stupid."

He looked over at her. "You're famous."

She snorted. "Hardly. They like their Spirit Detectives a lot around here, so they'll ask each one to donate an item so that they can display it and people can ooh and ahh over it."

"Do _I_ have to?"

"You can refuse but they'll just put up a portrait of you."

"As long as they get my best angle, then I'm cool with that."

She raised an eyebrow. "Your best angle?"

He gestured to the back of his head and she laughed, which made him laugh, and he was sure they were getting stares by now, but he didn't care. Clarke's knife drew his attention again.

"Why the knife?"

"I got it during my first case, as a gift from the girl I saved, and I found it one day and didn't think I really needed it anymore."

"You're so famous. You got _gifts_. No one's ever thanked me for my good deeds."

Clarke patted his arm. "Patience is a virtue."

"File that under things I don't believe in."

"Like ghosts?"

"Well, obviously, I've had to modify my beliefs on that." She smirked. A tour group had stopped in front of them, congregating around the next item, and it took a bit of maneuvering to get around them. "Where to next?" He asked, once they'd safely reached the other side.

"You should pick this time."

Bellamy pretended to think about it, tilting his head back and forth as if to decide between a few options. Mostly, he just wanted to see if she'd get aggravated by it. She did, elbowing him hard in the side, growing guilty once he clutched at the war wound she'd inflicted.

"See why I don't believe in patience?" He wheezed out, partly for the dramatic effect. Clarke saw right through it, rolling her eyes.

"Just get on with–" She was cut off by someone, a little boy, much shorter than Clarke, running into her, jostling her out of the way, knocking her back against Bellamy. He immediately steadied her, one hand reaching out to grab a hold of her arm and the other on her back. A rushed _Sorry!_ was muffled as the tour group started moving towards them, in her direction, and she tried to get past them in the same measure.

"You okay?" He said, although she didn't look worse for wear, just surprised and disheveled. There wasn't any look that he wouldn't like on her.

"Yeah," she muttered, brushing down her dress with her free hand. She smiled gratefully at him, distracted. He let go of the other arm, removed his hand from her back. "Where'd he go?"

He looked around, spotted him huddled over on the floor. "Found him."

When they reached the little boy, they shared a look, deciding on approaching him slowly. He crouched down, said in his best soothing voice, the one he used to use on a young Octavia whenever she was upset (at him, at their mom, at the world), "Hi. Are you okay?"

Startled, the boy looked up, eyes wide. He tried to scramble backwards but ended up falling back down. "It'll be okay," Clarke said, trying to smile at him. "You shouldn't run in here, though. Are you lost?"

He sniffled, then shook his head.

"Okay, then. My name is Clarke. This is Bellamy. Can you tell us why you were running?"

"I was – I was supposed to take something," he started, and then sniffled again, forlornly. "I'm sorry, I didn't _mean_ it, they _dared_ me to so I _had_ to." He was slightly hysterical now, the volume rising with each word. Clarke looked over at him, alarmed.

"It's okay, it's okay," he repeated. "Can you tell us your name? And who dared you to do that?" It took a few minutes for him to calm down, but eventually, he did.

"Joey," he answered, almost in a whisper. "There were these three boys and they said I had to do it or I was just a baby and I'm _not_."

"Can you tell us what you were supposed to take?"

"Something from the Spirit Detective," came the answer, recited. Joey was looking at Clarke, so Bellamy assumed that was who she meant. Over his head, Clarke frowned at him. "Am I going to get in trouble?"

"How about we make a deal, Joey? If you help us find these boys, we'll pretend this never happened."

He nodded meekly. Bellamy made sure his smile was welcoming and friendly and reassuring. "But you know that stealing is wrong and no matter who tells you, you shouldn't do it, right?" Joey nodded again, this time more certain. At least there was that. "Okay, come on."

Joey got up first, waiting around for Clarke and Bellamy. He felt her eyes on him as they followed Joey, weaving through the crowds.

"What?" He finally asked.

"That was good," she said. He glanced at her and was surprised to see the sincerity in that statement reflected in her eyes.

"I've had practice. I basically raised Octavia, remember?"

"Yeah, but," she paused, looking ahead. "You did good. Just take that compliment, please?"

It was hard to, because he didn't know how to, but he nodded anyways, a weird feeling in his chest. "Thanks. And uh, thanks again for this. It's been a good day."

She smiled. "My birthday's in October."

He hid his grin and filed that information away.

 

***

 

"You're standing the wrong way," Clarke said, almost lazily, from her spot on the bench. They'd been in the training room for half an hour, ever since Clarke had woken him up from his nap and pushed him out the door. Half an hour apparently wasn't enough to get him to stand in the right position.

"I'm standing exactly how you told me to," he pointed out. His shoulder still hurt from the fight he'd unwittingly gotten into with a demon – an actual demon, for the record, because _that_ happened here – named Dax, but it would've been a lot worse if Clarke hadn't taken care of the guy with a blast of _something_ from her index finger that knocked him out. The Spirit Gun, Clarke later clarified, kneeling beside him as he clutched at his shoulder. It released a burst of spirit energy through her finger, acted like a bullet from a gun, and that was what he had to learn today.

"How can it be so precise that it only works when I stand one specific way?" He adjusted his left foot ten degrees to the right. "You were on the ground when you used it."

"I've been doing this for years," she explained dryly, which was a point he couldn't argue with. "Here –" She was suddenly right behind him, her hand on his forearm, moving it down just a tick, her foot nudging at his ankle as a sign to pivot slightly, and her other hand tapping at his hip. She didn't put any pressure in her movements, as featherlight and quick as they were, but he still stared too hard at the places she'd touched. Somewhere between listening to Clarke tell him about her disaster of fifth grade zoo field trip, their museum not-date, and closing his fourteenth Spirit Detective case, he just accepted that he had a crush on her. It wasn't so bad, though. He got to see her all the time, got to hang out with her almost all the time, and it helped to remember that they probably wouldn't see each other again after this.

So mostly, he just ignored it.

He followed her direction, letting her guide him to where he needed to be. "There. This is the best way to access your energy. Once you get the hang of this, you won't have to go through all these steps."

She stepped back and he refocused his eyes back on the target on the wall. He heard Clarke's quiet, muttered, "Concentrate," as he raised his right hand in the classic finger gun gesture, pointed it at the target, and felt the surge of energy rush toward his index finger. Bellamy wasn't a stranger to guns, because Miller was his best friend and Miller's dad was a cop who thought they needed to learn how to shoot a gun _just in case_ , but holding a gun and channeling energy into his hand were two separate things. He blinked and saw a beam of blue light hit below the target, the force and surprise of it making him stumble back. The wall was intact and the only sign that there had been any contact at all was the small burn mark. He looked over at Clarke, who tilted her head.

"Not bad."

"You're definitely just saying that."

"I'm serious."

"You always are, but that didn't even hit anywhere inside that circle," he grumbled.

"I couldn't get it to shoot when I first started," she said, walking back to the bench. He walked beside her and sat down, slumping against the wall, hissing when his shoulder bumped against it painfully. Clarke's impassiveness shifted almost instantly, her eyebrows furrowing as she pulled him away from the wall and pulling down the collar of his shirt to examine the injury.

"Uh –"

"You were supposed to tell me if it was still hurting," she bristled, adjusting the bandage.

"It's not that bad," he muttered. She pressed down on his shoulder and he winced, unable to hide that expression. "It'll be okay."

"I'm changing that bandage later." She was glaring at him, but he saw the concern in it, felt the way her hand was, almost unknowingly, rubbing his back soothingly.

He pretended to be put off by that, but he wasn't. "Fine. But can we take a break before I try this again?"

She rolled her eyes. "Ten minutes. I have to leave in a bit."

"Where are you going?"

"Just have something to do."

"That's not vague at all."

"Like you're surprised?" He snorted; she was right.

Bellamy thought she might've drifted off a few minutes later because her breathing was steady and the room was nearly silent, but he chanced it. "Can that… can the Spirit Gun kill someone?"

There was no answer for a bit, and then, resigned: "Yeah."

He had to be careful with his next question. "Speaking from experience?"

Again, even more resigned, if that was possible, "Yeah."

He was quiet.

She went for nonchalance, but almost achieved it. "You can judge me for it, but I don't care."

"I'm not." He was telling the truth, knew that he had no idea of the context, knew that Clarke had seen and been through things he had never seen or been through, had led an entirely different life the past three years. He was an asshole, but he couldn't be _that_ much of an asshole to ignore all of that.

"It was in a tournament. I'd made it through five rounds without having to – but Cage, he was the guy, he had me trapped, and he was threatening my mom, kept saying that all he had to do was say the word and and he could have a guy kill her that second, and I had to. I still don't know if he was telling the truth, but I couldn't – _risk_ that on a bluff." The words came out like she couldn't help it, like it was a relief to tell someone, like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders. Had she not told anyone else before?

"Maybe…" he started, "Who we are and who we have to be to survive are very different things."

Clarke stared at him, long enough to perturb him a little. "Where'd you get that from?"

"Me."

"That's terrible. Definitely don't quit your day job." It took him a minute to understand that she was _teasing_ him.

"See if I ever impart some of my wisdom to you ever again."

"That would be a huge loss for me."

"I knew it would be."

"Hey. Thank you."

"For what?"

"Just listening. It was… thanks."

He nudged her shoulder with his injured one, wincing a little as he remembered. She knocked her knee against his in return. "Anytime, Clarke."

 

***

 

It was way too early for a run, but he was restless this morning, unable to sleep more than a few hours, so instead of laying in bed to hopefully fall back asleep, he got up and decided to run. He never ran this early, and had no idea that other people actually _did_ run this early in the morning, so when he passed Kane, it took two calls of his name to realize that he wanted his attention.

"Oh," he said, for lack of a better thing to say. "It's really early."

Kane chuckled. "It's a good time to run. No one else is around."

"Seems like it." He really regretted taking this route; Kane liked him but they weren't on small talk terms. The most they had talked was honestly the first night he met him and Bellamy preferred to keep it that way. He really had no complaints with that system. Clarke dealt with talking to Kane, debriefing him on their cases, while Bellamy did the paperwork. Again, good system.

To his credit, Kane picked up on the stilted conversation and made to move. "I'm glad you're settling in nicely and good work so far, especially with the Titus case. We never thought we'd get him."

He nodded awkwardly, a little uncomfortable with the praise. It honestly wasn't very _challenging_ work, so he didn't actually deserve any compliments about it. And the Titus – wait – "Sorry," he said, startling Kane back from where he'd advanced. "Who's Titus?"

Kane gave him a look and spoke more slowly than he had before, which was annoying, but he clearly thought Bellamy knew about this Titus guy when he didn't. "You probably know him as the Flamekeeper."

"Nope." Bellamy was good at paying attention too, so the fact that he had missed this entirely didn't add up. "It's my case?"

"Clarke said –" he cut himself off just as Bellamy realized the same thing: that Clarke had kept something from him, something that wasn't a personal thing, something that he evidently was supposed to know. His ears rang. At some point, Kane clapped a hand to his shoulder and said his goodbyes, but Bellamy didn't catch them.

He thought she trusted him by now.

 

***  


When he got home, Clarke was awake, hair tossed up in a messy bun, but otherwise looking perfectly normal, bright, beautiful like always, and not at all tired. She poked her head out of the bathroom when he closed the door.

"Hey! You were up really early today," she said, smile on her face.

"Went for a run," he explained absently, ducking into his room to change his shirt. He tossed his glasses onto the desk. She was staring at the doorframe when he looked back up.

"That early?"

"Couldn't sleep." He knew his responses were short, but he couldn't bring himself to fix it. He was annoyed about whatever Clarke was keeping from him, annoyed that Clarke didn't care enough to tell him about it, and simultaneously annoyed at himself for assuming he had a right to know. Except. It was his _job_ , or it was for the remaining time, so he had _some_ claim to this case, didn't he? It suddenly made sense, Clarke looking through files that she hid from him, Clarke always having some place to be.

He tried to pass her, but she stepped in front of him, tilting her head right where he had pointedly stared away from her.

"Maybe you should sleep a little longer, I can handle the cases for today –" That got to him. His head snapped up and he glared at her, a little too harsh before he tempered it.

"Who's Titus and why does Kane think I helped arrest him?"

Clarke's smile disappeared immediately but she didn't give an answer, didn't stand down. Even though he was frustrated by all of this, he was begrudgingly fond about that. Of course she wouldn't back down. "Did Kane say something?"

"No, I just read your mind," he replied, crossing his arms. She followed suit.

"Kane didn't need to say anything to you."

"Were you going to tell me?" She pursed her lips. That was a no. It stung. "Thanks, Clarke."

"It wasn't something you needed to know about." She offered it simply, offered it like it was nothing. Except it was. All this time, he thought they were a team, a partnership – that was how he saw it. That was why he enjoyed doing this as much as he did. It was why he was even the slightest bit sad to let go of it eventually. Clarke obviously didn't see it that way.

He was quiet when he spoke, trying to keep the hurt out of his voice. "When it's my job, it's something I need to know. I don't care what it is. Kane thought I _did_ know and I don't know why I didn't, except that you didn't tell me, and that's –" He exhaled. "I don't know why you don't trust me now, but I would've liked a heads up. That's all." He pushed past her this time and ran a hand over his face, squaring his shoulders when he heard Clarke's voice behind him, shaky but sure.

"I trust you," she said, and the worst part was that he knew she meant it, and believed her when she said it. Clarke wasn't someone who threw that around like it was nothing.

"Then why didn't you tell me about the case?"

"It's – personal," she said, torn. "It doesn't have anything to do with you."

"None of these cases have anything to do with me! I'm not asking for a story, I just wish you'd told me you were working on something, at _least_. I would've helped. You know I would've –"

"I know!" Clarke nearly shouted and it made him turn around to face her. She was flushed with anger, her brows furrowed, the line of her mouth set in steel. It made him angry to see her angry, as if she had a right to be angry now. She was the one who kept things from him. "I know you would've." Her next words came with resignation. "But I didn't want you to."

He took a step back, almost involuntarily. She looked upset, but she also looked like she meant those words. "Okay," he said, hollowly.

"There's a _reason_ for that," she pleaded, walking towards him, reaching for him, but he stepped back again, turning around and heading for the kitchen, the first place he saw. If she followed him, he could ignore her. He was good at ignoring people. Wanting something to do to keep his hands busy, he started making coffee. By the time the coffee started dripping into the pot, he heard Clarke's steps, tentative and slow. He kept his back to her, focused on the steady drip of the coffee.

"Bellamy," she said softly, apologetically. "Bellamy. Can you please look at me?"

"Do you want some coffee?" He said instead.

Clarke grabbed his wrist and tugged it towards her, pulling him in her direction. He tried not to look at her, partly out of pure stubbornness, but he couldn't not. Her face was open, vulnerable, genuine. "I know you don't understand it, but… it was something I had to do by myself."

He locked eyes with her. "Why?"

"Where do I begin?" She sighed, trailing her hand on the counter.

"From the beginning?"

"Which time?"

"Okay, how about who Titus is?"

"He used to sit on the Spirit World Council and basically decided where souls would go."

"Used to?"

"Turned out he was abusing his position, taking in bribes, promising resurrections, so he got kicked out."

"And he didn't like that," Bellamy guessed.

Clarke nodded. "A couple of months ago, before you arrived, he stole this ledger? It has the names of all the souls that have passed through Spirit World –"

"That doesn't sound like it could go wrong at all."

She snorted and they shared a timid smile. "Yeah, well, it did, to no one's surprise, and he wanted the names to basically… raise an army. Attack Spirit World."

"Jesus Christ."

"So I had to stop him."

"But I could've –"

"The leader of the army, her name's Lexa." Her voice changed, shifted into something akin to regret and sorrow. He shifted closer to her. "Remember how I had a girlfriend who left me to die?"

"Yeah," he said slowly.

"That was Lexa."

He must've reacted incredulously because she laughed a little. "Obviously, I know how to pick them."

"I thought – well, I thought you were exaggerating, like, bad breakup, but she stopped talking to you or something."

"The breakup was bad, but I didn't really have a choice after what she did. Take it from me, it's hard to trust someone after something like that."

"What – happened?" He trailed off, realizing that this was what she meant by _it's personal_. Suddenly, he felt like a dick. He didn't have any right to pry into her life, even if they were friends.

"It's fine," Clarke said, as if she could hear his thoughts. Smiling reassuringly, she squeezed his bicep. "You were right. I should've told you, about the case, about where I was going, because we're friends, and this –" she gestured between them, "It doesn't work if we're not open with each other."

He could've lingered on that wording, wondered if there was any chance she meant it in a context beyond friendship, but he didn't want to think about it. It wasn't the time. There was a shuffling of feet, his feet, as he closed the gap between them and enveloped her in a hug, hesitant at first, until she brought her arms up around his back, pulling him close. He breathed her in and tucked his head in her hair, in the crook of her neck. She laughed softly, squeezed him tighter.

When he finally let go, reluctantly, because he liked being that close to her, having her right against him, she kept her eyes on him. Both of them were leaning against the counter.

He broke the silence first. "I'm sorry I pushed. It wasn't fair of me to do that. I was just, I don't know, it –"

"Hey," she cut him off. "We could go in circles. I forgive you. Do you forgive me?"

He nodded and she grinned, bright, unabashed. "Okay. Good. I'm still going to finish my story, though."

"So she let you almost die?"

"That tournament," Clarke said, and he remembered which one right away because it was the one she had killed Cage Wallace with her Spirit Gun, "Lexa and I were on the same team and we were facing Cage and his team in the finals. They were really good, really vicious, and we didn't know how we were going to beat them and then, it turns out Lexa decided instead of beating them, she would join them instead." His eyes widened; he was surprised his jaw didn't drop open. "Yeah. Made a deal with them that she would give up and let them win and left me alone. Cage almost killed me and she – walked away to save herself." Clarke looked down at the counter, focusing on it for a few seconds before she looked back up. "Probably in the top 3 worst moments of my life."

"Fuck," he said, which sent Clarke on a round of laughter that confused him.

"Sorry! When I tell people about this, they just say they're sorry, like they had anything to do with it. Thanks for not doing that."

He rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "Mostly I don't know how to process it."

"It took a lot of time. Sometimes, it comes back to me, but I had a lot of time to think, and I guess the reason I felt I had to do this alone, take down Titus, was because I needed that – closure with her."

"Did you get that?"

"Yeah, I think. Arresting her helped a bit."

"Remind me not to get on your bad side."

"Who says you haven't?" It was hard to tell if she was joking until he saw her smile and while he wasn't _worried_ (that much), he still relaxed.

Gesturing to the now finished coffee, he said, "If I make you some coffee, am I off the hook?"

Clarke pretended to think about it. "It has to be great coffee," she decided.

"Deal."

 

***

 

It was different after that. It felt like an equal partnership now; he thought they had had that before, but this was more. This was them on the same page, sharing the same cases, falling into the same step.

He still nursed his crush on her. That wasn't different at all.

 

***

 

Loneliness didn't really hit him until a month in. While it hadn't been _easy_ to forget it, it was harder to focus on it while he was staying busy, and that first month, between learning everything there was to know about the Spirit World (great library, by the way), trying not to fail as Spirit Detective, and trying to figure Clarke out, gave him enough to do to take his mind off the loneliness of his situation.

He missed Octavia – he always missed her, it was like a second state of mind for him, even when she hated him, like she had to after their fight, the way her eyes flashed dangerously at him before she slammed the door in his face, always passing through his mind – but he also missed his friends, missed Miller's sharp sarcasm, Bryan's terrible jokes, Monroe's word of the day obsession, Gina's trivia bets, Lincoln's one-armed hugs that everyone loved, and it tugged at him the more he remembered, thought about them. He missed being _alive_. It figured that he would finally give a shit about it once he died, because every cliché had to be true.

Being in Spirit World, even knowing he would be back soon, wasn't the same, and he really did try not to dwell on it, but he couldn't help it sometimes. Clarke caught him one day, moping in his bed. By now, it was the late afternoon and the only times he'd gotten up were to pee and grab a bowl of Ghostios. Bellamy didn't sleep in normally, not when he had been alive and not in the past month, so he could hear the confusion when Clarke knocked on his door and called out, "Bellamy?"

"In here," he answered, sitting up slightly so he'd look somewhat presentable and not like he'd been laying in bed all day. Clarke walked in and then stopped in the doorway. Her eyes lingered on his chest, then darted away and once he looked down at himself, he remembered he wasn't wearing a shirt.

"Uh," he said, embarrassed, despite the small – he pretended – part of himself that liked the blush on her cheeks and her determined avoidance of her eyes. The last time something like this had happened, he had been pulling on a shirt over his head and missed her reaction. "On the desk." Clarke walked over and grabbed the shirt he'd flung on top of it and tossed it to him. She was more composed now, more like the Clarke he knew, but it'd been nice to see a flustered Clarke too. It was nice to see that she was flustered because of him. He put on his shirt quickly, clearing his throat when he was actually presentable. "What's up?"

She dawdled by the desk, running her fingers across the top. "I haven't seen you all day."

"I like this day off thing," he teased, a smile on his face. "You're just the busy one."

"I'm not that busy."

"You were up at 6 today and this is the first I've seen you."

"It doesn't help when you're hiding away in your room."

"I wouldn't call it hiding away."

"Is everything okay?"

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Did you ever get lonely? When you, you know, had to do this by yourself?"

"Not – I didn't really think about it."

There was a lot more Bellamy had to learn about Clarke, but he knew enough that she wasn't telling the truth. She had that air of perfected indifference in that answer, along with the stumble. "At all?"

"No," she said firmly.

Skeptically: "Really? Never?" Clarke cut her eyes at him.

"I've always been okay by myself." She was stormy defiance for a second before she wavered. "I didn't mean –" she started, stopping with a frustrated noise. She walked closer to his bed, waited for a sign that it was okay to sit down. He nodded and she sat down at the edge, near where he was, and stared hard at the sheets. Then, softly, "Do you want to talk about it?"

Bellamy thought about saying no; he wasn't sure that she actually _wanted_ to hear about it or if she felt sorry for snapping at him, or worse, felt sorry _for_ him, but he did want to talk about it, and he wanted to talk about it with Clarke.

"It's hard, sometimes, that's all. This is – not the _best_ thing that's happened, but it could've been worse and it shouldn't matter because I'll be back soon, but I miss… home. O, my friends, even O's evil dog." He chuckled at a memory of Helios peeing all over the house. If he was laughing about that, then he really must've missed them.

Clarke had a small frown, a considering one.

"And I'm really glad I met you, I don't think I could've survived all if this if I hadn't, and you've made all this so much better, even fun? I guess, I don't know, I don't want to impose on your time or anything, and you don't have to hang out with me – honestly, I don't know where I'm going with this–" He ran a hand through his hair, pulling it up roughly. "It just sucks sometimes. But I'll get over it."

The frown deepened and he saw the hurt flash in her eyes. "We're _friends_ , Bellamy. You're not _imposing_ and I _like_ hanging out with you." Her voice was direct, heavy, and offered no room for doubt. He smiled at her, relief and affection battling for control.

"Ditto," he teased, but he meant it. Obviously, he meant it. She scoffed and the mood felt lighter, felt better. It felt good to say all that, but it felt better to talk to Clarke.

She scooted closer up and reached out a hand, hesitant at first, and smoothed out the hair that must've been sticking up at all angles. His eyes fluttered shut for a moment, enjoying her fingers in his hair. When he opened them, he saw the pink on her ears. Clarke cleared her throat.

"Do you want to meet some of my friends?" She asked, unexpectedly.

"Now?"

"In a few hours. There's this bar, we just get drunk and see who's shittier at darts. They kinda want to meet you."

It didn't require much thought. It sounded fun already, but he mostly wanted to meet Clarke's _friends_. She rarely mentioned them, but he could tell from the times she did, she loved them. "Yeah, sounds great."

 

***

 

He could never get used to going into the Human World (or that name) but for what it was worth, he wasn't expected to get used to having a corporeal body despite still being (almost) _dead_. He really only did this for work during the rare times the two worlds crossed paths.

Monty and Jasper were there, happy to see him despite their last encounter. Bellamy was glad, because he liked the two of them, thought they were pretty harmless and funny, and it felt good to have familiar faces around, even if he'd only met them once and it'd almost caused Jasper to have a heart attack. He wasn't going to be picky. He was quickly introduced to Raven, who gave him a long look up and down that made him uncomfortable, but he glanced over at Clarke, who was smiling, so he didn't mind so much after that.

Raven seemed skeptical that he really existed. But since he didn't _actually_ exist – except in a strange sense of the word – it was probably a fair reaction.

Monty, Jasper, and Raven were human, and they were alive, but they were all able to travel to and from the Spirit World, and it was through Spirit Detective work that Clarke had met them, become friends with them.

He liked them too.

Clarke slumped down in the seat next to him a while later, struggling at first to sit down properly, and he bit down a laugh at her tipsiness. They had drinks together sometimes, but she never seemed to let herself relax enough to enjoy it.

"Are you having fun?" She asked before resting her head on her arms, keeping her face towards him. He wanted to move the hair away from her eyes, but she just pushed it back, huffing in annoyance at it.

"Monty is really cool," he said with a grin. He'd hung out with him the most, had found out that they had a lot in common – favorite books, sports, movies, and even, at one point, had overlapped at the same school for a year and a half – and had learned how he'd gotten his ability to go to Spirit World (near death experience; it was always near death experiences). "We're best friends now."

"They can't like you better than me," she frowned and she really was cute. It was probably time he should stop pretending she wasn't, or that seeing her every day was the best part of his day, or that he didn't think about kissing her more than he should, given how they technically worked together, and that they were dead, and that he had no idea if he would ever see her again after this.

"I'm a man of the people. I can't help it that everyone likes me."

She managed an eyeroll. "Monty likes everyone."

"Does _Kane_?" Admittedly, it was weird, having Kane's respect.

"Considering Kane likes me, I wouldn't really brag about it too much."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Almost as if it was so simple that it didn't require a spoken answer, "I'm not a very likeable person so he doesn't have the best record."

He stared at her quizzically, not sure if she was joking or if she actually meant it, actually believed it. There was only a serious look on Clarke's face, like it was a truth she couldn't deny. "You're likeable. I like you."

She kept her eyes on him, but didn't say anything, didn't even hint at anything. It was unnerving.

"I was lying before," Clarke finally said, distant, and he copied her position, resting his head on his arms, ignoring the way his glasses dug into his skin.

"About?"

"I'm always lonely. No, that's not it. Before, before you got here, I was always lonely and when I go _back_ , I – I'm scared it'll be the same way." It was a very visceral sort of sadness in that acceptance. He wanted to reach out and pull her into a hug, to try to get rid of that sadness. Then her eyes flickered down, and he followed their movement, followed the upward quirk of her mouth, more forlorn than anything. "But. I'm really glad you're here. I know that's selfish but – I'm just really, really glad you're here. That we're – friends." She peeked up at him through her eyelashes and he swallowed hard.

After clearing his throat, he grinned, halfhearted at first but genuine, bright, after. "I wouldn't have chosen anyone else to be dead with."

The snort from Clarke made him laugh too and the sadness that stuck to them a few minutes earlier dissipated.

 

***

 

By the time they were ready to go home, Clarke was less drunk and more too tired to move. If it hadn't been for her hand in his, he was pretty sure she would've wandered off to sleep at the bar. Thankfully, it didn't take too much effort to get her to get back to Spirit World.

She struggled with the covers before finally claiming victory and blinked slowly at him as he stood there, no doubt with an obvious look on his face. He counted on her being too tired to notice.

"I'll get you some water," he said. She shook her head.

"Can you sit down for a sec? You're making me dizzy." He obliged, sitting at the edge of her bed, feet knocking against her nightstand. "Did you have fun tonight?"

"I did. I didn't know you knew how to have fun," he teased with a small grin. She made a face at him and he made one back.

"I have _fun_."

"I believe you, Clarke," although her snort said all that needed to be said about how unconvincing he was. "Next week, we can go meet my friends, they're not that fun so – what?" She had a guilty look on her face and her eyes darted down to her lap.

"We can't do that."

"Okay, then the week after?"

"No, I mean." She bit her lip and sighed, meeting his eyes, grumbling, "I wish Kane would tell you things sometimes."

"I'm definitely missing something."

"You can't see your friends until this is over. It's just – you can't." She made it sound less like _there was no way to do it_ and more _this is absolutely forbidden._

He tensed as he took in her words. Somewhere, though he didn't give it much thought, he had assumed that he would be able to stop by Human World to check in on his friends, to check in on Octavia – after all, he had to travel there all the time as Spirit Detective, and Clarke had just introduced him to her very-alive, human friends and Clarke was, last time he checked, still dead-ish. He pointed it out.

"They have a natural affinity to Spirit World, it's how they can bypass these rules." At least Clarke didn't look like she enjoyed delivering this news. He was grateful for that.

"So I can't… see anyone else until then? I can't –" _See Octavia_. That was the worst part of it. The longest he had been apart from Octavia was a week and that was because she had been on a school trip, but now he couldn't see her for almost _two more months_ and he was expected to be okay with that.

Stricken, Clarke reached for his hand, grabbing it tightly. It was comfort, sympathy. "I'm _so_ sorry, Bellamy. It's because of the probationary period you're in. Spirit World thinks contact with the people you know, I don't know, jeopardizes the transition back to life. That's how they explained it to me and I tried to argue against it, but they won't change it, and Kane was a dick about it, and I think it's so stupid, and I'm –"

"Clarke," he interrupted and she was startled from her impromptu ramble.

"Yeah?"

"It's okay." It really wasn't, but he had dealt with worse in his life. He was fine with okay.

"It's _not_ ," she said immediately, fiercely, and he wanted to kiss her right then and there. Clarke could see through him so easily and that didn't scare him, like it usually did with other people. She listened to him, understood him. She had tried to get whoever was in charge to change the rule so he could see his sister. He swallowed the lump in his throat and smiled at her, squeezing her hand.

Without thinking about it, with his free hand, he reached over and brushed some stray strands of hair away from her eyes, tucking them behind her ear.

"It's two months. As long as they're okay, I'm good," he said honestly, almost made himself believe it completely.

"They are," she said. "I checked on them and they visit you in the hospital all the time, and your sister's there every day." The laugh he let out sounded watery and he sniffed, willing himself not to cry. Two months was nothing.

He didn't know what to say, except _thank you_ a hundred times, just for the information, just because Clarke was here. She squeezed his hand, so he thought maybe she knew.

Maybe it was how late it was, or because her guard was down after the night, but he liked to think it was because Clarke wanted to say it, meant it completely, would've said it in any other situation. "I'm going to miss you when we're back to normal."

Accidentally, he pulled his hand back. It was hard to ignore the fact that once the three months were over, there was no guarantee that he would ever see Clarke again. He'd gotten so used to being around Clarke every day, talking to her, laughing with her; he couldn't think of a world that he didn't know Clarke.

His voice was shaky to his ears when he finally said something. "It's not like we're going to forget about each other."

"Really?" She sounded hopeful.

"Yeah."

"It won't be weird?"

"It won't be weird. I live right by DC. I heard there are things like cars still–"

"Shut up," she protested, reaching tentatively for his hand until she caught it in hers, linking their fingers together slowly and dropping them on top of the covers.

"Can I ask you a question?"

"You just did."

"Funny." He ignored her _I know_. "Why'd you change your mind about… death? Staying dead."

Clarke was subdued in her answer. "I realized I was running away from everything. It was easier to die than it was to face my mom or my friends or how fucked up my life was. And then I got to a point that I wanted to stop running away."

He tugged at their hands slightly as a sign of comfort. "That's really brave."

"Just a few years late."

"Who cares?"

She peeked up at him with a small, reluctant smile. "Obviously not you."

He laughed. "I just think, you know, there's so many other things to worry about. This shouldn't be one of them."

"Coming from the chief worrier himself."

"Then obviously I'm an _expert_."

Clarke tightened her hold on his hand and he squeezed back. "So."

"So."

"Do you – uh, you should – probably go to sleep now."

"Right," he said, mildly. Then, he registered her words. "Right!" Tearing his hand out of her grasp in his haste to get up, he missed the way her smile dropped. "Um. Good night." He couldn't read her face, but she pulled the covers up from where they'd slipped down.

"Good night," she said softly, but not tiredly. He couldn't hear any exhaustion in her voice. "See you tomorrow?"

He nodded. The room was silent now and it was late but – he didn't really want to leave. Still, with a half-aborted wave, he closed the door, standing in front of it for a minute, before he made his way to the kitchen.

He left a glass of water and some aspirin on the kitchen table.

 

***

 

Bellamy woke up a few hours later and went for a run. When he _had_ been able to sleep, his mind had decided to ruin his life by dreaming about Clarke, kissing her, waking up with her, fucking _going grocery shopping_ with her, and he wasn't in the mood to deal with that just yet, so he pulled on a shirt and left a note for Clarke in case she woke up before he got back.

As it turned out, he got back before she woke up, but after his shower, he found Clarke pouring herself a cup of coffee and grimacing when she had to turn around.

"Hi," she said miserably, squinting at him. He laughed.

"Regret turning down that water?"

"I don't like this side of you."

"What side?"

"The not hungover side." He plucked the mug out of her hands and took a sip of it before making a face. Clarke's penchant for black coffee was the bane of his existence. "That's what you get for stealing my coffee."

"That's just mean. I was going to make you breakfast and everything."

Like they were magic words, she brightened up considerably. "Really?"

"I feel like being nice today."

"You're nice all the time, Bellamy."

"Go take a shower, Clarke."

She grinned at him, the best Clarke grin, the wide, uninhibited one, and his heart stuttered. She grabbed her mug back from his hands, patted his stomach on her way out of the kitchen. "I'll make it up to you next time," she promised, and he was super proud that he was able to keep his cool until he heard the bathroom door close.

Honestly, it was his own damn fault that he got himself into these situations.

 

***

 

He knocked on the door nervously. Monty opened it a moment later.

"Hey," he said, welcoming smile on his face. He was glad that he'd asked if he could hang out with him before he just showed up at his door. There had been a split second where he thought about taking off and looking in on Octavia, but he didn't want to risk anything. "How are you at Mario Kart?"

"Uh," Bellamy thought about it. It had been years since he last played. "Probably bad?"

"Perfect," Monty said cheerfully. "I can never beat Raven so this is going to be good for me."

Amused, he sat down and picked up the second controller. "Glad I can help."

Twenty minutes later, Monty was thoroughly trouncing him in the game. Apparently, he wasn't far off when he assessed his own Mario Kart talents, or lack thereof.

"Thanks for being so bad at this," Monty said after they finished a game, stretching out his arms and yawning.

"Anytime," he said and he meant it. He hadn't been lying when he said he liked Monty and he hoped that after he got out of Spirit World, Monty and Jasper and Raven could meet his friends too. And Clarke. He wanted Clarke to meet his friends.

" _So_ ," Monty started, dragging out the word. "Where's Clarke?"

"She's been putting off paperwork for the whole _I'm coming back to life_ thing." He played it off like it was casual because he was trying not to spend even more time thinking about Clarke (and had already broken that vow), and part of that goal was supposed to be achieved by hanging out with Monty. In retrospect, picking one of Clarke's friends was not the best idea.

Monty lit up, catching him off guard for a second. "It's so weird to think she'll actually be – alive, you know? I didn't think she'd do it."

"Really?"

"I don't know, she's always been not _adamant_ , just, she never said anything about _wanting_ to go back." Bellamy didn't respond; he didn't really know what to say, didn't really know that from the time he had gotten to know her. "I'm glad though. She seems a lot better now." The last part was quiet, almost an afterthought to himself, but Bellamy heard it.

Curious, he prodded, "What do you mean?"

"When I first met her, she just – she was going through a lot. So I'm just happy she's doing better. Whatever it is."

He thought about it for a bit, staying silent as Monty started up a new game. "You think so?" He ran through the time he spent with her.

"I do," he answered simply and firmly. Bellamy could feel Monty's eyes on him and it prickled at him, made him wonder why he was looking at him, but the door burst open and Raven strolled through.

It took her kicking off her shoes, hanging up her jacket, and hurling herself onto the couch before she noticed Bellamy was there. When she did, she raised an eyebrow at him. "Did I know he was coming over?"

"I texted you an hour ago."

"Oh, right, _that_ Bellamy."

He frowned. "Do you know a lot of Bellamys?"

"Monty didn't mention Clarke so I didn't think it would be this Bellamy."

"Raven," Monty sighed.

"What? They're like a package deal these days. Remember how she mentioned him in every story?"

"Raven!"

Defensively, although he wasn't sure why, and a little flustered: "We do spend a lot of time together – we _work_ together –"

Smugly, Raven sat back, propping her good leg up on the table. "Easy, Bellamy. Just letting you know I approve."

"I–" It was embarrassing. He was supposed to be _good_ with words. "Okay?"

"At least more than the last girl she brought home so just try not to fuck it up, okay?"

Monty snorted. "You like _strangers_ more than you liked her."

"Pot, kettle, you know the drill."

They continued to bicker but Bellamy tuned them out, caught up in thinking about what Monty had said earlier, about what Raven had just said. It was still a lot to take in, and now he was _really_ thinking about Clarke, in ways he tried not to think about her unless he couldn't help it (accepting a crush and actively wondering if she felt the same way were chasms he couldn't reconcile). When Raven demanded the controller from him, he gave it up quickly, thankful for the reprieve to just stare dazedly at the game.

 

***

 

He tried to act normal about it but once he let himself wonder if Clarke felt the same way and if he should maybe tell her about his feelings, then he couldn't stop. He caught himself second guessing every sentence she said, lingering on every little touch, debating every possible meaning ( _could_ "Did you want some egg rolls?" actually mean "Hey, I want to make out with you?"). It was, quite frankly, the worst thing he'd ever put himself through.

And to make matters worse, Clarke started noticing.

She paused, sometimes, when he took too long to answer a question, gave him confused looks when he shied from her touch. He could tell she wanted to ask, but she never did, always bit down on the question, until she finally did one day, on their way to confront a guy they'd been looking for for a few weeks now, snapping at him when he focused too hard on the floor while she said something to him. The elevator even gave a little lurch, as if it agreed with her. It probably did; he was being a goddamn mess about this.

"All right. What the hell is up with you lately?"

He cringed at himself. Clarke slammed the stop button and this time, the elevator actually did lurch, heavily and loudly, screeching to a stop that hurled both of them forward. Bellamy finally looked at her, incredulous, alarmed.

"What the _hell_?"

"My question exactly."

"Hasn't anyone told you not to hit emergency stop buttons?"

She rolled her eyes. "We're not getting out of here until you tell me what's going on with you."

"What do you mean what's going on with me?" He was the worst. He was just the worst.

"Oh for fu– you know what I mean! You've been acting so _weird_ arou– weird lately. What's going on?"

"I've… got a lot on my mind," he finished lamely, knowing it sounded like an excuse and yet still hoping she'd accept it as a truth she wouldn't pry more into. But if she did that, that wouldn't be Clarke, and that was another reason why he liked her. It was a never-ending cycle.

"Tell me about it," she almost commanded, if it wasn't for the hurt in her voice, well-masked until her words ended in a question.

Bellamy ran through his options. As he saw it, there were three: 1) he could tell her that he had a crush on her and had been wondering non-stop if she felt the same way and end up facing probable rejection; 2) he could make something up and blame it on Spirit Detective Stress™; or 3) he could change the subject and then try to get out of the elevator as fast as he could, close their case, and then hide himself in his room for the foreseeable future. Instead, what he decided to do was this: "Do I have to?"

Clarke flinched back, stepping away as if she'd been electrocuted. "Clarke," he said, realizing his mistake immediately, reaching for her, but she ducked forward, pressing the stop button again. She was calm as the elevator heaved back into motion.

She turned to him when he said her name again, a smile forced onto her face. "You're right. You don't have to. We're late anyways."

"Clarke," he tried.

The elevator reached the lobby and the doors opened. "Let's go," she said, walking away, leading the way.

He pinched the bridge of his nose, smudging the lens of his glasses in his movement. Nice job fucking this up, Blake.

 

***

 

The worst part about Clarke being mad was that she was aggravatingly non-reactive about it. She wasn't angrily ignoring him, she was just pretending everything was fine. If he didn't know any better (he did), he would assume he hadn't been a total dick to her just a bit ago.

Of course, he apologized, because his guilt wouldn't let him go two steps without making sure he did, and aside from that, he knew he was wrong, and he'd hurt Clarke, but she brushed it off with a hand and a shrug.

"I accepted it the first time, Bellamy," she said, scanning the nearly-empty parking garage for the silver hovervan they were looking for. Two weeks ago, a girl had been reported missing and nine days ago, they had come across the girl – turned demon – breaking into an apartment, feral movements and vacant eyes. After they turned her back, she pointed out the man responsible for her transformation – Commander Shumway, a disgraced former member of the Spirit World guard. Shumway had claimed two more victims since then. The tip that brought them here identified this parking garage as his next target and a silver hovervan that belonged to Shumway.

Clarke hid behind a car and waited for him to join her, which he did with a slow approach. He leaned over her shoulder to peer over the trunk. "Yeah, but I'm pretty sure you didn't actually accept it," he muttered, intending for her to hear it.

"You don't know me as well as you think you do," She said back, bumping her shoulder back into his chest. He nearly lost his balance.

"It's really, really nothing, Clarke," he stressed.

"Then why won't you tell me?"

He squeezed his eyes shut. He had to tell her. Not now, obviously, but he needed to. He would stop overthinking everything, Clarke would know, and if he got rejected, he got rejected. It was fine. "I will. When we get home, I'll tell you."

"Really?" She was skeptical.

"Yes," he said. "You're going to be so mad that I didn't say anything because it's such a non-deal."

He heard the grin in her voice. "Doubtful. Everything's a big deal to you, Bellamy."

"No, it's not," he argued, almost for his honor.

"Like you're not biased."

"Speak for yourself!" Clarke turned around, ready with another retort when she went silent. "Wh–" he started, cut off by her hand over his mouth. She drew back a few steps, pulling Bellamy with her.

" _Shumway_ ," she mouthed, jerking her head in a direction over her shoulder. Oh shit.

They split up, Clarke taking the left side, Bellamy rounding the right side, in approaching him as inconspicuously as they could in an empty, echoing garage.

"Commander Shumway," Clarke called, voice loud and clear as she approached him carefully. They had no weapons in hand, but Bellamy knew how quickly she could load her Spirit Gun.

"Ms Griffin," he said, too confidently for a man who was facing two Spirit Detectives and impending arrest. "I've yet to congratulate you on your retirement."

Another step closer, just as Bellamy brought up the other end. He locked eyes with her briefly and nodded. "Is the other one here? The replacement?" He scanned the scene just as Clarke spoke again, the words that would snap a pair of Spirit Cuffs onto his wrists once finished. "You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say may be used against you in the Spirit World Tribunal."

Shumway ignored her, whirling around when he spotted Bellamy. His eyes lit up in glee. "Two Spirit Detectives! This _is_ an honor!"

"Commander Shumway," he said. "It's best you listen to Clarke."

He thought about it, Clarke reciting behind him. "No. I don't think it is." And then it happened in a flash, the group of demons summoned by Shumway jumping out of the van, lunging for Clarke, breaking her concentration. Bellamy saw it too late, saw Clarke tackled to the ground right before one of them hurled itself at him, clawing for his face.

Bellamy cursed, ducking on instinct only for its claws to dig into his back, dragging deep down into his skin. He hissed in pain, stumbling and hitting the side of the van. He could hear Clarke fighting with the other demons, the snarling on their end, her grunts and cries of pain. Shumway stood in the middle, delighting in the exhibition.

The demon was back on its feet, teeth bared, ugly, rotted, melting, and Bellamy had to act fast, yanking the doors – which were mercifully unlocked – open and slamming it once, twice, three times into its face. It screeched horrifically, recoiling back and he needed time to charge the Spirit Gun, wished he had used it more than once outside those practices, wished he had more in his arsenal. _Fuck, fuck, fuck_ , played on repeat, along with _where is the fuck is Clarke_ ; at this point, he was doing anything he could to keep it away, kicking at it, pulling punches, using the door as a shield.

Bellamy felt his energy concentrate into the tip of his index finger. "Come on, come on, come on," he muttered, from his spot behind a different hovercraft a few feet away. The only consolation was that he could still hear Clarke fighting; if she was still fighting, she was still alive.

A snarl came from behind him but before he could react, it trapped him against the the hovercraft, his face slammed into the cold metal. The demon was too strong for him, and he knew he couldn't break his hold. It clutched his left arm in its clawed fingers and squeezed tight, and he remembered –

" _Spirit – Gun_ ," he gasped out against the metal, and a blast threw the demon away from him, the force of which had knocked it unconscious.

Bellamy slumped down to catch his breath and flex his shoulder. The movement sent a spike of pain through his arm but there was nothing he could do now. He needed to get up, needed to find Clarke.

When he got back up, his heart stopped.

Clarke was bleeding at her temple, had a cut under her eye, a split lip and her wrists were restrained by Spirit Cuffs that cut off her Spirit Energy. Worse: she was thrashing around in Shumway's grasp.

"Let her go," Bellamy snarled, trying to remain calm. He'd heard that being calm was good in situations like this, where he'd almost gotten his ass handed to him only to find his co-detective/girl he liked held hostage by a disgruntled psychopath.

Clarke stopped fighting Shumway for a second to catch Bellamy's eye, and he swallowed down the fear he felt at the sight of the fear in her eyes.

"I didn't think it would be so easy to capture a Spirit Detective," Shumway remarked smoothly as Clarke whimpered as he yanked on her hair and wrapped a hand around her throat. Bellamy's vision blurred with anger, clouding his thoughts. He breathed out, and in, and took a step closer. Shumway tightened his hold on her throat; Clarke squeezed her eyes shut. "If you want to save her, you'll stay right there."

"What do you want?" He demanded, gritting out the words between his clenched teeth. He needed to find a way to get Shumway away from Clarke; he needed to buy time.

"Drop the charges against me and let me go," he said simply.

"That's not up to us," Clarke hissed out. Shumway lazily glanced at her, smirking.

"It is if you want to live."

"Kane will never go for it."

"That's not my problem," he said mockingly. "After everything he's done to me, my career, my _title_ , it's his turn to jump through some hoops for once in his goddamned life." He went on, volume rising and anger building with each sentence, and Bellamy used the distraction to sidle closer, tense and anxious. Clarke noticed him right away; _Spirit Gun_ , she mouthed as small as possible, except – except he didn't know if he could do it again. He had never used it twice in a row, never used it ten minutes within each other, didn't know if he had enough energy to summon for it.

But he had to try.

Clarke, scared and bleeding, was still trying.

"Clarke," he said, voice surprisingly strong and unwavering.

She answered right away, eyes wide but trusting. Clarke trusted him. He couldn't let her down. "Yeah?"

"I'm so sorry."

She smiled, watery and despite everything. "I accepted that the first time."

– And then she elbowed Shumway in the gut, forcing him to let her go, at the same time Bellamy aimed his Spirit Gun at him.

A loud _bang_ exploded in his ears.

The last thing he heard was Clarke's strangled _Bellamy_ before he blacked out.

 

***

 

His arm was numb when he woke up so he tried to shake it out, which would've worked if it hadn't been for the blonde head resting on it. Blearily, he opened his eyes, shook his head to clear the blurriness only to realize it was because he didn't have his glasses on, and took in the curly blonde hair fanned out across the bed and the girl hunched over with her head in her arms.

"Clarke," he croaked out, throat too dry for sound. Still, she heard it, or maybe his attempt at shaking out his arm had woken her up. In any case, she blinked sleepily at him, as if she was unfamiliar with where she was, until recognition kicked in.

"Bellamy," she gasped. There was gauze taped to her temple, a small bandage under her eye. Her bottom lip was slightly swollen and she looked exhausted, but relieved, happy. He realized that it was because she was happy to see him. "How are you?"

"I'm–" he coughed, then looked down at himself. His left arm was in a sling and his back stung and he felt sore all over. "Alive?"

"No shit. It's been 18 hours," she said, but her voice broke at the end. He looked up at her, found her with her lip between her teeth and her hands clasped in her lap.

He was on alert immediately, sitting up straight and trying to reach for her hand. Her eyes were watery when she looked up at him. "What's wrong? Did he hurt you?"

"No, no, I'm fine," but he didn't think the cuts on her face constituted his definition of fine. "He's in custody, they're not letting him out of their sight."

Relief overtook him so suddenly, it felt like someone had punched him.

"Thank God." Clarke's fingers intertwined with his a second later and squeezed and he felt the same relief on her end. "I didn't think the Spirit Gun would work again," he admitted.

"It's why you passed out. You're not meant to use your energy up so quickly like that because there's a chance your body won't be able to restore it and I –" Clarke's grip was nearly a vice grip at this point. Her chin wobbled as she continued, "I still told you to do it."

"Hey," he said softly, running his thumb across hers, which helped her loosen her grip. "It's not your fault. You didn't know."

"But I _did_ know," she protested vehemently, frantically, eyes searching his face. "I knew how it was going to work and I still had you use it because I was fucking _scared_ –" this, she spat out like it was a capital offense, "And I'm so sorry, I'm _so_ –"

"I didn't have to do it," he cut in, "I didn't know if it would even work, but even if I did know what was going to happen, I would've done it."

" _Why_?"

He kept his eyes on her. "Because I would've never been able to live with myself if something had happened to you."

He saw her suck in a breath and then shake her head, as if she was trying to clear her thoughts. "You shouldn't have done that," she said. Clarke's voice was reminiscent of the first time they met, business-like and formal.

It was frustrating; Bellamy knew she was trying to shut him out. "Why not?" He asked, just to be difficult.

Her stony façade didn't last. "Because! Because I could've _lost_ you," she choked back on a sob and his heart lurched. "I could've lost you and I can't – I _can't_ lose you, okay? I can't."

There were two other times in his life that he had felt the world shift underneath him: when Octavia was born and when he had died. This was the third. There was something noticeably different about them at that moment and he heard what she said and hoped it meant what he thought.

The room was quiet, save for the faint noise that beat against the door.

Clarke seemed to shrink into herself, her head dropping down and her hand tugging out of his grasp.

He scooted over to her, closer, despite the strain it put on his back to move. "Clarke," he said and she looked up, eyes cloudy. He reached out, slipped his hand to her face to cup her face. Her eyes fluttered shut with a pretty sigh and when he caressed her cheek, she rose towards him, eyes half-lidded. He saw the desire there and it coiled in his stomach. He licked his lips and her eyes flickered down to them.

"Kiss me," he said, and it came out as a plea.

Clarke laughed softly and surged up to press her mouth to his, tentative at first until he closed his eyes, pulled her closer, and she kissed him harder. It was a kiss he'd thought about for months and still, it was better than he imagined, because it was real and Clarke was kissing him back, tangling her fingers into his hair, letting out pretty, longing whimpers and gasps that he knew he would remember for a long time.

"Bellamy," she gasped against his cheek, her fingers digging into the back of his neck, as he trailed kisses down her jaw. They were positioned awkwardly, uncomfortably, Bellamy restrained by the sheets on the bed, unable to touch her with his other arm in a sling, and Clarke leaning against the bed, straining to press close despite it. "Is this – _oh_ , do that again –" he obliged, "– are you okay?"

He had to shake the fog of desire away to understand her question. Of course he was okay. He had wanted this for a long time. But she meant his injuries so on the one hand, he couldn't deny that his back had started aching and his arm had grown numb. On the other, he was finally making out with Clarke. He could suffer through a little pain.

Unfortunately, Clarke didn't subscribe to that philosophy. She kissed him again, lingering and teasing, before they pulled apart and she rested her forehead against his. He steadied his breathing and took in the darker blue of her eyes, the flecks of gray throughout, the cuts on her face, the mole above her lip.

"Hi."

"I was _fine_ ," he complained, but she just grinned and kissed him, this time a quick, casual peck. He could still get used to it. "Come up here."

"I'm not going to make your injuries worse," she admonished.

"Please?" He snuck in another kiss.

"I was going to go to med school, remember?"

"Painkillers and I'm fine."

"Nice try."

 

***

 

In the end, he took the painkillers and convinced Clarke to cuddle with him on the unfortunately uncomfortable hospital bed and as they laid there, slowly drifting off to sleep, her head tucked against his chest, one arm looped across his waist, he thought, _I could get used to this._

He rubbed circles into her back and she hummed contentedly. "I guess I don't have to tell you when we get home now," he mused.

"Hm?"

"That I like you. As you know, more than a friend."

She was quiet for a while, concerningly so. It filled him with dread; had he been _too_ honest? Maybe she didn't feel the same way, had just wanted to make out with no strings attached. Maybe he was pushing –

" _That's_ why you ignored me for a week? _That's_ why you were acting like that?" Clarke was trying to sit up at the same time as she indignantly turned her head, which didn't work out at all, causing her to fall back onto him.

"I–" he said, at a loss for words. "I was trying to figure out if you… felt the same."

"By _ignoring_ me?"

"I didn't do that!"

A loud scoff punctuated the room. "I asked you on a _date_."

"What? _When_?"

"The museum? For your birthday."

He gaped at her. "I thought… it was a friend thing. You should've specified!"

"Fine, I guess it wasn't technically a date, but I thought you were cute and wanted to spend time with you."

"I obviously didn't know that!"

The news that Clarke had been into him maybe as long as he had been into her was going to take some time to process. She laughed suddenly, muffling most of it into his chest and he abandoned all attempts to go back and dissect every one of the previous interactions. Clarke was right here and she wanted to be here.

He laughed with her. "We have a lot to figure out."

"We have time." Bellamy hid his smile in her hair.

 

***

 

The sharp ringing of the phone forced them both awake.

"There's a phone?" He asked sleepily, pulling Clarke closer.

"By the door," she answered, burying her face into his neck before she, all of a sudden, bolted from his arms and scrambled to the phone, picking it up on the fourth ring. Bellamy slowly sat up, brow furrowing at what had just happened. Actually, he didn't know what had just happened.

"I'll be right there – yes – no, it's not a problem, thank you," she said before she hung up. She turned back to Bellamy, wide, bright smile on her face. Her hair was slightly mussed up, but the smile would've drawn anyone's attention. "Don't freak out."

He regarded her warily. "When people say that, it tends to make them freak out more."

"All right," she conceded. "Try not to freak out."

"Why? Who was that? What's going on?"

Clarke had already opened the door. "I'll be right back – three minutes, tops –" At what he assumed was a surly expression on his face. "I have a surprise for you."

Her perked up a little, asking hopefully, "I can go home and we can make out in your bed?"

She laughed, shaking her head. "Not yet." He grinned. It wasn't a no. "Okay, sit back and close your eyes and I'm going to knock when I'm back." Clarke took off before he could say anything in response, shutting the door behind her.

He didn't close his eyes as he waited, mind running through all the surprises he could think of (not many – being in a hospital really limited his options). A few minutes later, Clarke's sharp knock came.

"Are your eyes closed?" She yelled.

"No!"

There was a bit of rustling, then the handle twisted, and the door opened and Clarke still had that smile. "Are you ready?"

"Ready for _what_?" He grumbled.

Clarke opened the door wider and waved her hand.

It was Octavia. It was his sister who stepped inside, hands twisting together and lip wobbling as she saw him. His breath caught and he looked helplessly at her, at Clarke, the latter of whom was biting her lip nervously.

"Bellamy?" Octavia asked, voice soft and incredulous.

"O. O, how are you h– I don't understand." This, he directed at Clarke. Octavia was here, but she couldn't be here, because he wasn't supposed to see her, except if he was seeing her right now, then –

"No, no," Clarke was quick to say, eyes widening as she realized what he'd concluded, "It's not that. She's okay. She's fine. I thought you'd like to see her."

He blinked back tears as he listened to her, understanding that this was Octavia and somehow, although she wasn't dead, she was still here. "How?"

"Kane didn't put up too much of a fight after Shumway."

"Oh my God," he said, still stunned. He looked back at Octavia, who was struggling not to cry. "I don't know how to –"

"You don't have to thank me," Clarke said firmly. "But he would only allow two hours which started a few minutes ago, so I'm gonna go and leave you guys alone to catch up. When the phone rings again, she'll have to leave." She was obviously apologetic about the time limit, but Bellamy didn't care because he was finally getting to see Octavia after two and a half months. His heart ached with how much he had missed her.

Clarke was heading towards the door with a little wave. "Thank you," Octavia said suddenly, voice thick with tears. Clarke's face softened and she nodded at her.

"Wait," Bellamy said. Clarke turned around, questioning. "Come here." She cocked her head in challenge, but headed back towards him. Once she was close enough, he tugged her wrist down, pulling her towards him, and captured her lips with his, kissing her a _thank you_ , a _I'm so lucky to have you_ , and a _thank you again_. Only when Octavia cleared her throat did they stop, Clarke with a dazed look on her face, and Bellamy, he was sure, with a wide, smug grin.

After Clarke left, trying and failing to hide her smile, Octavia sat down in the chair next to his bed. Her eyes were red, but she had a knowing look. "So," she said. "Girlfriend?"

"I hope so, yeah."

"How did you _die_ and still manage to get a girlfriend?"

"Luck?"

Octavia's laugh was what he'd missed the most. "I have _so_ many questions."

"I can try to answer most of them."

She scrubbed a hand over her face and sighed. "How did you end up here?"

"I don't know. I guess when you die, or almost die, you have to stop by Spirit World at first. Spirit World is –"

"No, I know that. I think. Clarke explained it a little already."

"When did…"

"She brought me here, remember? And I wouldn't just go somewhere with a stranger without finding out everything first."

He smiled proudly at her. Stranger danger was an important lesson. "What else did she tell you?"

"That it sounded unbelievable, but that she knew you and she could take me to see you and that I should trust her. I don't know, she sounded so sincere about it."

"You trusted her just like that?"

Octavia snorted. "No. I made sure she actually knew you first."

"Good job."

Softly, she said, with a sad smile on her face, "She knows about Mom?"

"Yeah."

She surveyed him for a moment. "You really like her."

He thought about Clarke, the way she'd smiled before she left. "Yeah. I really do."

"She's okay, I guess," a hint of teasing behind the words, "I probably owe her after this."

"You do," he said sternly, which made her burst out laughing again. Wryly, he had to admit that was the most normal they'd been since their fight. Remembering it sobered him up. "Hey. About what happened – when we fought –"

"Wait," she said, apology lining her forehead. "Let me go first. I'm so sorry. It was so stupid and I made such a big deal out of it and I didn't mean what I said, honestly, you're the most important person in the _world_ to me." She hiccuped on a small sob. "I love you, Bell."

"I love you too, O," he finally managed, and now he was crying, pulling Octavia into a hug, squeezing her tight. Octavia's sobs were loud, mingling with his, but they were cathartic, necessary. The first item on his Alive List of Things to Do had always been to make things right with her, and now that they had, he felt so much lighter, so much freer.

Once they calmed down, she sat back down in the chair, cross-legged and nosy. "Okay, tell me all about her."

 

***

 

He was discharged later that day and had never been so happy to see their non-descript, Spirit World HQ-style door. He told Clarke so.

"You were in the hospital for a day and a half," she replied, rolling her eyes, but as soon as they stepped inside, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down for a kiss. He laughed into her mouth and pushed her back against the wall, so glad that this time he could actually touch her, hands on her hips, thumbs digging into her warm skin before rucking her shirt up. She squirmed against him, giggling as his fingers danced up her stomach.

"Way better than a hospital," he said, his lips ghosting over hers. Her hand dropped to play with the collar of his shirt.

"More privacy."

"Better walls."

"Better beds," she concluded, the lazy smirk she adopted so hot that he stole another kiss, pulling on her bottom lip until she moaned into his mouth, fingers clutching tightly at his hair, body arching against his. He was never going to get tired of that, kissing her, being able to kiss her anytime, knowing that she wanted to kiss him too.

They stood there for a few minutes, catching their breath, until Clarke turned him around and pushed him towards the kitchen table, sitting him down. He obliged.

"We need to talk about a few things," she said seriously, a crease between her eyebrows.

"What about?"

"About where this is going. About what's going to happen after – after we go back." Time had taught him when Clarke was pretending she wasn't nervous, and he could easily pick it out now. She stressed her words differently, focused her eyes too hard on something. She was nervous, but trying not to show it. He wanted to tell her that she had no need to be, because he was nervous too.

But he thought that he should be brave too. "I want to be your boyfriend. Is that – okay?"

Her hand jumped to her chest, as if she was trying to steady her heart, and she nodded, small at first, but her smile gave it away. "Of course it's okay. Yeah, of course." She looked down at the table, but still couldn't shake the smile off. _Good_ , he thought. "And after? It'll be… an adjustment being alive again. A lot to get used to again."

"I want to."

"Me too."

The intensity of the conversation simmered after that, and Clarke finally took a seat. She was more relaxed, at ease, comfortable. They both reached for each other's hands at the same time and tangled their fingers together. That wasn't anything new, but it felt like something new.

"How does this coming back to life thing work anyways?" It struck him that although he knew this would be happening (in two weeks, even), he had not wondered how it would play out. Was it like that portal in the museum? Did he have to press a button and he'd be alive again?

The answer was anticlimactic. Or rather, Clarke's answer was. "I have no idea."

"You've never seen it happen before?"

"You didn't read about it in your trips to the library?"

"Hey, don't make fun of the library. It's a great library."

"I wouldn't dare. But I honestly don't know."

"Should we… have a meeting place?"

"I don't even know where I'll be," she said, after thinking about it. "Find Raven. Raven'll know where I am." He nodded, made a mental note to do that. "Are you… how are you feeling about it?"

How did he feel about it? Excited, obviously, but that was more to do with the fact that he'd finally see everyone he'd missed for so long. Nervous, in a way. He bore no illusions about how much of a change it would be. Although it had only been a few months, living in Spirit World had been nice, something that didn't require a lot from him, apart from the occasional jaunts into danger. He didn't want to think about how many things he would have to do when he went back. "I feel like I'm ready," he said.

Clarke nodded, a distant look in her eye suddenly. "I wish I was."

"Maybe ready isn't the right word."

"I wish it hadn't been three years."

"You needed that time."

"Doesn't make it any easier."

"I don't think it's ever going to be easy." Clarke's face dropped, as if she was hoping for something more positive, something bolstering. "But it doesn't mean you can't try. You work on it."

She stayed quiet for a long time, but she squeezed his hand to let him know it wasn't because she was angry with him. "It'll be a lot of work."

He ran his thumb across her knuckle. "You're always up for a challenge."

"Like a Rubix cube."

He snickered. "Yeah, like a Rubix cube. And if you ever need help, I'm right here. Or there. However that works."

"There, I think."

"I would've gotten it eventually."

"Sure you would've."

 

***

 

His last day in Spirit World started off the same way his first day in Spirit World did. Well, technically, it didn't, but for the sake of parallel structure, it did; in any case, they were walking to Kane's office now.

Two weeks passed by a lot faster than he wanted it to that by the time he was supposed to be ready to go, he was only ready to revise his earlier confidence. Although he had tried to look into the specifics, no one gave him any information about how the return back to Life would work. And then, the night before, they were told to meet Kane in his office for the Send Off (that was what he had taken to calling it).

"Do you think he'll cry?"

"You really overestimate our importance to him."

"Not even for you? He's known you for three years."

"You're right. I might get a tear."

"What about me?"

"Awkward pat on the back."

The door swung open for them and they were ushered into the waiting area.

"This is where we first met," he pointed out. Nothing about the room had changed – there was still the same bland decor, the same stiff grey couch.

Clarke sat down and gestured for him to join her. "You had so many questions."

"It was a big thing to find out!"

"And you were cute."

"I'm not cute now?"

"You're acceptable now," she said, dodging his playful shove.

"See, that'd hurt if I cared about that stuff. Luckily I know you like me for more than my body."

"Well, your body's an entirely different story…" He cut her off with a sloppy kiss to her cheek, her laughter loud in his ear. She was still laughing when Kane cleared his throat, standing by the door to his office and looking at them in disapproval or fondness. It could go either way.

"Clarke. Bellamy," he said. "I had a feeling you would work well together."

"She's okay," Bellamy replied, making a face when Kane had his back turned. Clarke pinched his elbow as they headed inside. He gestured for them to sit down, so they did, in the uncomfortable leather-backed chairs. It dug into his back and forced him to sit up straight.

"I suppose you've been counting down to this day," Kane commented. Bellamy shrugged. He had a hard time keeping track of time in Spirit World and being here had never been or turned into a thing where he was ticking down the minutes as they passed. He wanted to go home, but Spirit World wasn't a nightmare or anything. It was just… three months of his life.

"Do you push a button?"

He looked confused, so Bellamy clarified. "To send us back. Is it something where you push a button and we wake up in our bodies again?"

"Not at all," he said, once he understood what he was being asked, and pushed forward two sheets of paper, placing one in front of each of them. "Once you sign this and I stamp it, you're good to go."

Clarke huffed out a laugh. "Just like that?"

"It's not a very complicated process. It just doesn't happen often."

"You'd think it would be more complicated."

"We like to foster that mystery." Kane tapped at the sheets and Bellamy looked down at it. It was standard contract jargon, something about him fulfilling the terms of their agreement, Spirit World honoring the agreement, him being released from Spirit World terms and conditions, blah blah blah. Once he finished reading it over – and was satisfied with it – he looked over at Clarke, who was biting her lip as she read. She seemed to catch his eyes on her because she caught his eye and smiled. Clarke hadn't said much about this in the past two weeks, but he knew that she was still nervous about it, still not entirely ready to go, even if she was ready to leave. Being a few steps away from that made it all the more real. It was impending, inevitable this way.

She finished and reached for his hand. He twined their fingers together and squeezed her hand. _I'm right here_ , he wanted to say.

"See you soon?" She asked, voice soft, but eyes sure.

"See you soon," he repeated.

When they signed it, Kane pressed a stamp to the corner of each of their documents, and he hadn't lifted the stamp for more than five seconds before the room started getting blurry and his vision started going in and out. He felt Clarke's hand clutching his, and then he saw nothing.

 

***

 

What Kane had failed to mention was that waking up in his body would feel like an electric current had just coursed through him. His body snapped up and he gasped for air, his head slamming back down on the pillow as he did so. He started choking on his gasps and didn't realize his name being cried out, or register the hands trying to sedate him.

"Bell! BELL!" Octavia's voice, shrieking and panicking, swam in his brain until they formed more solidly, a wall that said _this is Octavia, that's Octavia's voice_ , and he stopped thrashing around, blinked the sleep out of his eyes, and saw his sister, eyebrows furrowed in concern.

"O," he said, "Is this real?"

"Oh my God. Are you back? Are you back now?"

"This is the hospital?" Octavia nodded and he took in his surroundings. The room was smaller than the one in Spirit World, but it was undeniably a hospital room; he was attached to an IV and a nasal cannula, and the sheets were pulled tight around him from his rude awakening. "Yeah. I'm back." It was hard to wrap his mind around that. After three months, all it took was signing a document and he was back in his body. Like always, Spirit World was an underwhelming experience.

"And you're okay?" Octavia was hovering over him, examining his face like that would tell her if he was feeling better. Mostly, he felt like he'd been in a long sleep, which – he had.

"I feel fine," he said. "Is Clarke – is, where's –" His head jerked around, as if just looking for her would make her appear. Disappointment thrummed through him when he realized that she wasn't here, because this wasn't where her body was. He needed to find Raven, but he doubted Octavia would let him out of his sight for the foreseeable future.

" _Clarke's_ here too?"

"She should be. Somewhere. I don't know. We were both supposed to be back but I don't know where she is."

"You can find her later," Octavia said, already pushing for the nurse call button. "Hi, my brother's awake now."

But he was undeterred. "Did she say anything to you when she talked to you?"

"No, we were more focused on you, dumbass," she retorted, and he didn't even have to heart to be fake-affronted about the insult. "Can you let the nurse check up on you before you jump out of here to find your girlfriend?"

He sighed, a little unnecessarily loud to make her smile. She did, and then darted in for a hug. "Please never die again," she mumbled into his shoulder. "I'll kill you myself if you do it again."

He wrapped his arms around her – or did the best he could given his IV line – and squeezed tight, trying to fill the hug with all the times he'd missed her and thought about her and hoped she was okay. "Don't plan on it. They would probably kick me out anyways."

"They _should_. It's so much better here."

It _was_ better here. He was here, where Octavia was, where his friends were. He just wanted Clarke to be here too.

The nurse (who wore a name tag that said CATHY) came in a few minutes later, looking frazzled and quite honestly, just stunned that he was awake. She kept looking at him inquisitively as she unhooked the nasal cannula off him and after a while, he couldn't not ask.

"Is there something wrong?"

Octavia hung around the nurse's shoulder, peeking around to observe. Cathy was fixing the IV line, straightening it from when he'd knocked it loose. "No, your vitals are all normal."

"But?"

"There's no but!" Then, bemused, she explained, "We didn't figure that you would wake up this early. These things vary, of course, but there had been no change in condition for so long – of course, it's a great thing that you woke up. I didn't mean it in a bad way."

"It's okay." He tried to act like it baffled him too, even though he knew how it happened and why he woke up when he woke up. "I guess I felt like I'd slept long enough?"

"Yes, you must have." Octavia rolled her eyes over the nurse's shoulder and mocked him, _Good one_. He sniffed and turned to face ahead. After Cathy proclaimed him all okay, telling him a doctor would be in soon for another check-up, he slumped back down against the pillows.

"How long are they going to keep me here?" He rubbed his eyes, only just realizing that his glasses weren't on.

"Yeah, they're broken," Octavia informed him. "From the – accident. But I can order a new pair tomorrow, if you want? Or I can try to find your old pair until –"

"O, hey, we can wait on that. How long have you been here today?"

"Just an hour."

"Go home, get something to eat, do anything else. I'll be fine."

"You just want to get me out of the room so you can go find Clarke."

"As much as I want to, I can't do that until I find her friends and I can't get out of here until who knows when. I do want you to take care of yourself though."

"I take care of myself just fine."

He held his palms up in surrender. "No arguments here."

She frowned at him, but acquiesced. "Fine, I guess I _am_ hungry. And I need to tell everyone you're awake now. Do you want me to bring you back anything?" She had already slung her bag across her shoulder.

"Change of clothes?"

"Gotcha."

When she reached the door, he stopped her. "Also, if you could find out when I can leave, that would be –"

"Yeah, yeah, already on it."

"You're the best, O."

"Of course I am," she scoffed. "Okay, see you soon."

The door was closed for maybe ten minutes before the handle twisted open. It was Octavia again, bewildered. "Uh? So this is really weird."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "What is?"

She stepped aside and just then, Clarke was standing in the place she stood, in a hospital gown like his, with a wristband like his, a smile like the one that had just spread across his own face. Although I couldn't have been more than a few hours since he's last seen her, when he had held her hand as Kane approved their return, it felt much longer. There was a sense of deja vu involved, but he only paid attention to the overwhelming feeling of everything falling into place, of the world settling around him. He didn't know how long they stood there, taking each other in, eyes running over her, making sure she was okay, making sure she was here.

And then it snapped and he was the one who flung off his sheets first, nearly tripping over himself to close the distance between them, getting tangled up in the IV line – Cathy was going to be so mad – and Clarke laughed, slightly choked but completely happy, and she met him halfway so he could sweep her up into his arms, stumbling into the bed.

He held her face between his hands and she still had that smile on her face, so he kissed her. She didn't hesitate to kiss him back, one hand clutching onto his wrist.

Octavia cleared her throat pointedly. Again, deja vu.

She huffed exasperatedly. "Next time, do this when I'm not here please. I'm _actually_ going to go now."

"Sorry!" He shouted after her, even as Clarke hid her face in his neck, shaking with laughter.

He pressed a kiss to her ear, brushed back the hair that was covering her face. "You were here the whole time?"

"Yeah," she said, shrugging helplessly. "I woke up and my _mom_ was there and she was telling me about where I was and what had happened and I kept thinking the name was so familiar, and it _was_ , because I'd been here before, when I got Octavia and I wanted to find you immediately but –

"Me too, I did too–"

"I ran into Octavia and… hi."

"Hi."

He settled back onto the bed, still holding onto her hand.

"My mom will be back in an hour," Clarke said, looping her arm around his waist as his closed around her back.

"Meet the parents already?" He teased, almost serious. Clarke had already met Octavia. It was only fair to even the score.

Her hair tickled his chin. "Maybe after you take me out on an actual date first."

"What, you're not counting this as one?"

"I took you to a _museum_ , Bellamy."

"That's third date material for me."

"Oh, then I guess you can meet my mom." She was getting sleepier, her voice growing drowsier, and he felt like he was about to follow.

"Can't wait," he mumbled, rubbing her back until his arm grew heavy.

"Hey," Clarke said later, when he thought she'd already fallen asleep. Her breathing was steady and comforting.

"Yeah?"

"Is this weird? Being alive again?"

"Completely."

"It's not even the hard part yet."

"So what do you want to do?"

Clarke pressed a kiss to his collarbone. "Can we sleep?"

He nodded against her head. "Sounds good."

They could figure everything out later.

 

***

 

(He met Abby Griffin later that day, and it was about as much of a disaster as anyone would've guessed, but that was a different story.)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm bestivals on tumblr!


End file.
